Like this:

Related

Post navigation

6 responses

Recently, I’ve been writing a haiku here and there. I’ve stuck to what I’ve been told is the traditional form: five syllables/seven syllables/five syllables. Obviously, there’s room for variation. But are these variations, yours included, considered haikus? AWG

I wrote the post but draw from other writers on the subject. Take a look. As I remark in the post, I consider Lee Gurga’s book Haiku: A Poet’s Guide to be the finest book on writing Haiku currently available.

The first answer is that you’re right: The traditional form is 5/7/5. The second answer is that this is true IF you’re writing in Japanese. Syllables in Japanese aren’t the same as syllables in English; so that writing 5/7/5 in English actually fails to accurately reproduce the brevity of Japanese haiku. A more accurate parallel would be 2/3/2 in terms of stresses (in English).

Could my poems be considered haiku?

The short answer is no. They’re not written in Japanese. Nothing that’s not written in Japanese has any claim to being called a haiku.

The long answer is yes. Yes, if what makes a haiku is not primarily its form but its content. The Japanese themselves have shown themselves willing to alter the traditional form and still call their poems haiku (though this isn’t entirely without controversy). The Japanese have also been increasingly open to foreign language “haiku” and have even begun translating foreign language haiku into Japanese.

To me, content and brevity are key to haiku. I personally think that the 5/7/5 pattern (in English) is too long. I’ve more or less settled on my own style. I like to think it would translate well into Japanese, but until a Japanese reader or poet confirms that I can’t really say whether they would be considered haiku (by Japanese standards). Alternately, just because one writes 5/7/5 in English doesn’t necessarily mean that a Japanese reader would consider such a poem a haiku, that’s why I think content is more important than form.

Well, if they were just sentences they’d be much easier to write. As it is, writing them makes me observe the day in a way I normally wouldn’t — I’m more ‘mindful’ — looking for that observation, that little realization. On the one hand, you may be expecting too much from the haiku, or the wrong thing, or too little. They’re like origami. They may look simple, but what you don’t see is all the folds that went into it. A sentence may not carry more than its own weight. A good haiku, in my judgement, carries much more than its own weight. The problem, for the western reader, when reading Japanese haiku is that this weight commonly resides in allusions that would only be familiar to the Japanese. We need annotations.

In my last haiku, about the rake, I could have written.

— I’ve lost my rake.

That doesn’t carry any more than its own weight, but add the observation that it’s buried under leaves and there’s a little joke there — the irony of the rake buried under leaves; the implication that, at some point, I took the rake out, got lazy or distracted, then lost it under the leaf fall. It’s not profound or particularly deep. It’s a little microcosm of human foible. It’s meant to greet the reader with a smile and humor. This is what you’ve got to learn to look for in good haiku, Tim — it’s that little something that turns the haiku into a doorway to a world larger than itself. There are good haiku and bad haiku. The bad haiku, indeed, are nothing more than sentences. Writing good haiku is deceptively difficult.

Yes, I like the way you write haiku; they’re clean, like little white lights. I also agree that annotations are needed if only to provide context. I’m reminded of Natasha Trethewey’s comments on the short poems (not her’s) she selects for the New York Times Magazine each week. You may have seen Jeffrey Harrison’s “Afterwards” in the October 18 magazine section, which almost seems like a haiku, and her remarks. Thanks for your post–I have some research to do.
AWG

Thank you! :-) It wouldn’t have occurred to me to describe them that way but now that you have, I couldn’t think of a compliment I’d rather strive for. Clean and like little white lights — that’s how I’d like them all to be.

I want the many readers who visit from other parts of the world to know that you're welcome in my home. We in the United States, as in any other country, aren't always represented by who governs us. It doesn't matter to me where you're from, what language you speak or what truth you believe in. What matters to me is what's in your heart—and my own heart is what I offer you.

Archives

Archives

Patrick Gillespie has self-published one book of Poetry and edited nothing besides. His poetry and criticism has been firmly ignored and hasn't been translated into a single language. Gillespie has never been a Poet Laureate (let alone a Poet Laureate of the Blogosphere), a Literary Fellow of the National Endowment of the Arts, or a Fellow of the Vermont Arts Council. He has received no prizes from the Poetry Foundation (or any other poetry related organizations) and the devil reportedly worries that Hell will freeze over if he ever receives anything like a Genius Grant from the MacArthur Fellows Program. He has been firmly rejected by any and all publishers. No plaques have been or will be dedicated to him or his poetry. Gillespie has received no recognition or prizes of any kind. He holds zero academic credentials or titles. In short, Gillespie is just like you -- of little to no importance to all but a few. You have no reason whatsoever to read him. He wears bottle-cap glasses, works as a Carpenter, has three daughters and a good sense of humor. He is currently replacing all the bad windows in his Vermont home.